Contemporary artist Xin Song takes the ancient Chinese folk art of papercutting to a whole new level — from large-scale sculptures and installations, to deceptively beautiful collages that comment on politics, society, and gender, to live performances that show the transformation of mere paper into art.

She created her installation for Pearl River Mart to be a quiet space where viewers could connect with and have a conversation with the work, gather their thoughts, reflect, or simply be.

About the artist

Born in Beijing, Xin Song creates contemporary Chinese papercuts inspired by the traditional form she learned studying with farmers in the Chinese countryside in her youth. Using her own photography, magazines, Mylar, rice and other papers, her often large-scale, site-specific installations use draping, hanging, glass lamination, and light. Her diverse themes range from venerable flower motifs and landscape studies to urban scenes that reflect her longtime residence in New York.

Among her numerous public commissions for the Manhattan Borough are her Five Elements for the Fashion District’s Broadway Boulevard Plaza, a permanent installation at the Bay Parkway Landmark Station, D Line in Brooklyn, and an installation for Grand Central’s 100th Anniversary Celebration awarded by the MTA Arts for Transit. She also has a permanent installation in lobby of P.S. 170 in Brooklyn.

The recipient of multiple awards and grants, her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. Notable recent exhibitions include the Venice Biennale, Noyes Museum of Art of New Jersey, Staten Island Museum, Musée du Louvre, National Art Museum of China, Prow Artspace of the Flatiron Building, and Paper Art Biennial in Sophia, Bulgaria.

Xin Song has been a guest lecturer at the University of South Florida, Tampa; SUNY College at Old Westbury; Stony Brook University; Hampshire College; Hunter College; and the Fashion Institute of Technology. She has created Chinese papercut and shadow puppet workshops for cultural institutions and schools since 2001.

Learn more about the artist in our interview with her.